Last summer, we were surprised by how many home exchange requests we received from Montreal. Almost none from Toronto or Ottawa, but plenty from Montreal and a few from Quebec City. At the time we had little interest in visiting Montreal, but this year, with Nick and Megan living there, we took advantage of the opportunity. We’ve spent the last few days in a nice condo near the canal, while Sarah and Olivier and their young daughter use our house as a base to explore Brighton and Prince Edward County.
We’ve been doing a lot of walking around the city and along the canal, and Ray has fit in a few training rides. It took me a while to switch out of small town mode and remember to stop smiling at people in the street and expecting them to say hello. “Just pretend you don’t see that person walking right past you. Stare straight ahead.”
On our first evening here, Nick was showing us how to use the Metro (it’s been ages since Ray or I have taken a subway), and I was reminded of the time my parents took their first trip overseas to visit me when I lived in Stockholm. We did the Eurail backpacking thing and it was all new and foreign to them so I was their guide. A very different situation, but there’s a transitional moment in parenting where your adult child is leading you instead of the other way around. Ray has a similar memory of a fishing trip with his dad where the roles became reversed.
Before we left for Montreal, Ray finished his spring/summer project. We already had a garden shed, but Ray wanted a more natural look, so he dismantled the old one and built a new one.
Nick recently got back from a business trip to Colorado, where the headquarters for the Kiewit Infrastructure Engineering (KIE) division is located. Most of the KIE interns work out of the Denver location, but the company flew in 130 interns from offices across North America for a few days. Each intern gave a short presentation of what they’ve worked on during their time at Kiewit.
They definitely treat their employees well as the interns were wined and dined during their visit. Nick’s first pic to us was of the fancy pizza oven that was part of the Italian restaurant in the cafeteria…where the food was all free! If the trip was intended to increase employee retention, they picked the right bait for him.
Our fundraiser appeared in this weekend’s Globe & Mail. We knew the article was coming out but we were surprised that it was featured as prominently as it was. It wasn’t intended to increase donations (the link wasn’t included), but with a weekend readership of over 1.5 million, some of those readers may be going through something similar to what we went through, and will hopefully take comfort from our story.
We’re thrilled that we’ve now exceeded our goal of raising $10,000 for this cause.
Lovely!! (By the way…I’m sure folks grabbed at the dismantled garden shed…but, if not…is it available? Doubt it!)
Yes, the old shed went to a neighbour. Sorry!
Of course…not surprising! 😉 good!
My son lives in Montreal too. We have a cottage in Quebec just outside the City. Just got back from two weeks there and several days in Montreal.. fun city!
Wow, that would have been pretty bizarre if we’d run into you on the streets of Montreal!
I read about Ray’s proposed ride starting Sept 5 from Sauble Beach to Kingston in the Globe & Mail Aug 12. I am a Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma patient at Cancer Center in Newmarket and have completed 6 rounds of chemo 1.5 months ago. I would like to know whether others such as myself can join Ray’s ride for at least some parts of it in support of your family as well as the Leukemia & Lymphoma Soc.
Hi George, thanks for getting in touch! We’d love to have you join for part of the ride. We’re away for the weekend, so we’ll get in touch early next week to talk about the options.